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Cairo–Cape Town Highway
Transcontinental road network / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Cairo–Cape Town Highway is Trans-African Highway 4 in the transcontinental road network being developed by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), the African Development Bank (AfDB), and the African Union. The route has a length of 10,228 km (6,355 mi) and links Cairo in Egypt to Cape Town in South Africa.
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The British Empire had long proposed a road through the Cape to Cairo Red Line of British colonies. The road was variously known as the Cape to Cairo Road, Pan-African Highway, or, in sub-Saharan Africa, the Great North Road. Like the Cape to Cairo Railway, the road was not completed before the end of British colonal rule.
In the 1980s, a modified version of the plan was revived as part of the Trans-African Highway, a transcontinental road network developed by the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA), the African Development Bank (ADB), and the African Union, named the Cairo-Cape Town Highway. While it uses most of the same roads as the original Cape to Cairo Road, it uses different routes in a few places.